Thursday, 24 September 2009

The following is the mail I sent to Dominic Grieve, shadow justice secretary, with regards to the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 which created, amongst other things, the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom.

"Dear Mr. Grieve,

I write to you with regards to the newly created Supreme Court. Will the Conservatives go along with this constitutional vandalism or will you seek to restore the law lords as created by the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876? Further, as the party seems to harbour, quite rightly in my opinion, some objects to the ECHR upon who's advice, apparently, part 3 of the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 was based on - will this accelerate your position on the Human Rights Act which you seek to abolish?

Finally, what are the prospects of scrapping the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 completely?"

This is the reply I got from one Mr. Robert Prager - aide to Mr. Grieve.

"Dear xxxxxxx

Thank you for your recent email to Dominic Grieve regarding the Supreme Court and the Human Rights Act. Your comments are duly noted and have been passed on to Mr Grieve for his consideration.

Conservatives appreciate your concerns regarding the newly established court. The Judicial Committee of the House of Lords has served this country well since the Nineteenth Century, and at negligible cost.

Now that the Supreme Court is in existence, it needs to function properly and within a sensible budget. Current plans, however, show it will cost £14 million per year to run, compared to £3 million for the previous arrangement. Most will consider that this project, conceived on the back of an envelope by Tony Blair and Lord Falconer represents financial profligacy that cannot be afforded in our current economic situation. However, we fear that the cost of undoing it would be even higher.

The Government has done this whilst at the same time refusing to make other changes that would improve the balance of the constitution. Parliament needs to be stronger, MPs more independent and the Government more accountable to the electorate. David Cameron has outlined Conservative proposals in detail, which can be found online at www.conservatives.com

With regards to the Human Rights Act, the Conservative Party has consistently expressed its concerns over the way it has operated in practice. The Act has failed to protect our core liberties, and exacerbated the impact of excessive judicial legislation from both the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg and our own domestic courts. If elected, a Conservative government would replace the Human Rights Act with a Bill of Rights in order to better protect our freedoms whilst giving Parliament greater democratic control over the process of creating new rights. Conservatives are confident this will preserve our personal freedoms, whilst strengthening democratic accountability and social responsibility.

Once again, thank you for taking the time to contact Mr Grieve."

Alas it was confirmed what most of us already knew; the Conservatives are patriots in word but not in name. They seem to believe that they are being financially pragmatic by not scrapping the Supreme Court. Yet to Mr. Grieve, somehow, you wont save money by using the Law Lords which are 460% cheaper than the current hodgepodge. Apparently saving £11 million each year is not a viable option, in turn meaning that they would pay of the whole building renovation in just 6 years (the Guildhall building had a price tag of £66 million for renovation costs and accessories). This is at a time when Mr. Cameron wants to cut the price of politics. Yeah right, pull the other leg.

Note also another piece of legislation which aims to bring us inline with the rest of Europe (yes I know that that Constituional Reform Act 2005 was conceived because of the ECHR) which will be put forth for further readings next year; the Constitutional Renewal Bill.

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Where Power Went

In the Palace of Westminster, exercised on behalf of elected representatives of the people. Democracy is not a spectator sport.

1971 FCO 30/104

"The transfer of major executive responsibilities to the bureaucratic Commission in Brussels will exacerbate popular feeling of alienation from government. To counter this feeling, strengthened local and regional democratic processes… and effective Community regional economic and social policies will be essential… there would be a major responsibility on HM Government and on all political parties not to exacerbate public concern by attributing unpopular policies to the remote and unmanageable workings of the Community."